Quiet on the herring grounds

Things are quiet on the herring grounds west of Iceland at present. Now those who still have quotas to catch are expected to switch to blue whiting in Faroese waters while there is little herring to be seen in amounts worth catching.

‘It has been slow since we got here yesterday,’ said Hjalti Einarsson, skipper of HB Grandi’s pelagic vessel Víkingur, currently in a position 100 nautical miles west of Reykjanes.

This is Víkingur’s first herring trip following the seamen’s strike as the ship was on the slipway at Akureyri just as the fleet came to a stop and was still undergoing maintenance once the strike came to an end.

According to Hjalti Einarsson, there is little herring to be seen.

‘A few boats were scratching a living on marks that were here yesterday, but the herring have dispersed today. There’s some dust on the sonars that looks like feed and sometime there’s some herring to be had by shooting on these marks. It’s impossible to say where this herring has come from or where it’s going. There’s too little of it and it’s too dispersed to be able to tell. We have 180 tonnes on board and the plan was to be at Vopnafjörður with enough for a good landing and then switch to blue whiting. Venus is now on blue whiting after landing herring at Vopnafjörður and I hear they’re now doing well in the Faroese zone,’ Hjalti Einarsson said.